


Wingless

by rebecca_selene



Category: FernGully: The Last Rainforest (1992)
Genre: Community: smallfandomfest, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-05
Updated: 2012-01-05
Packaged: 2017-10-29 00:36:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/313903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rebecca_selene/pseuds/rebecca_selene
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zak wants to go home. Pips puts things into perspective for him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wingless

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 10th [](http://smallfandomfest.livejournal.com/profile)[**smallfandomfest**](http://smallfandomfest.livejournal.com/) prompt “Zak/Pips, What is home?” submitted by [](http://artangst.livejournal.com/profile)[**artangst**](http://artangst.livejournal.com/) AND for my [](http://hc_bingo.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://hc_bingo.livejournal.com/)**hc_bingo** card prompt: homesickness

“Let me give you a hand there.”

Zak felt hands under his armpits, and his feet left the ground. He sighed and went limp, giving in to the inevitable. He wondered, not for the first time, why Crysta couldn’t change him back. Something about both people needing to want it. Well, he knew Crysta liked him well enough, but he thought she wanted to fix her magic spell over him more. So while she tried to figure out what was wrong, he’d made do with living among the fairies.

The red-headed fairy and his goons on beetles had made “Zak-napping” an official sport shortly after the near destruction of FernGully. Zak had been carried off from whatever task he’d been in the middle of no less than thirty-seven times in the week since the game’s inception, and by the twenty-fourth time, he’d figured out that resistance only fueled the fairies’ enjoyment.

Apparently, thirteen times weren’t enough to offset the Pavlov effect for them.

This time, though, instead of flying _across_ the forest to some distant location he’d have to walk half a day to get back from (probably no more than a mile, he always thought bitterly), Zak found the ground growing smaller and smaller below him. He gulped and instinctively reached up to grasp Pips’ wrists.

The fairy chuckled. “Don’t worry, Wingless. I won’t drop you.”

“All the same, I’ll hang on.”

“Suit yourself.”

Zak wanted to ask where they were going, but he didn’t want to encourage Pips. He just hoped he wouldn’t have to climb down all by himself, but no doubt the fairies had decided to up their game. He looked around, expecting to find the goons hovering, but he couldn’t see or hear them. Odd, but they must be behind Pips.

Suddenly, sunlight streamed onto his face, and he had to shield his eyes with one hand. He felt a surface under his feet, but still he didn’t let go of Pips’ wrist with his other hand.

“You’ve got two legs. You don’t need me anymore.”

Eyes streaming, Zak turned his face down, squinted his eyes, and saw that he had, indeed, landed on a solid branch. He slowly let go of Pips and wiped at his eyes.

“Didn’t think you’d be so touched by the sight of the sun, human,” Pips teased, legs dangling over the side of the branch.

“Well, you would too, _fairy_ , if you didn’t have wings to come up here whenever you wanted.”

Pips crossed his arms over his chest. “Good point,” he replied.

Zak glared at him and then looked below. Leaves and sunbeams stretched down, down, down, obscuring the ground from view.

Zak swayed, suddenly dizzy. He circled his arms, trying to regain his balance, and would have plummeted had Pips not grabbed him by the front of his shirt and pulled him back.

“Bit of advice: don’t look down. I didn’t bring you up here just to look at trees.”

Zak crowded close to Pips, secretly grateful that the fairy didn’t let go of his shirt, even as he replied gruffly, “Then why did you bring me up here? I gotta say, there are easier ways to kill me.”

Pips’ brow creased. “Kill you?”

“You know. The whole ‘kidnap Zak, make him walk or climb through the perils of the forest to get back h—” He stopped himself. That wasn’t right. FernGully wasn’t home. Was it?

Clearly, Pip didn’t think everything he’d said was right, either. “What you do mean, perils? What perils are there in the forest?”

Zak almost laughed, but then he thought about the question. What perils, indeed? He hadn’t ever been in danger on his treks back to the fairy glade. He found food and water everywhere he looked, the temperature was never too hot or too cold, no direct sunlight filtered down to burn him, and Crysta’s protection ensured that not even the lizards would try to eat him anymore.

What dangers, indeed.

“I…I don’t know. I guess I was just thinking of h—the city.” Zak’s brow furrowed at his choice of words.

Pips snorted. “The city sounds like an awful place.” He gestured out to the horizon with his free hand. “Can you see this in this city of yours?”

Zak took in the canopy top, the vibrant greens and browns, the sunlight dappling on the leaves, birds flying and chirping in the distance. He looked back at Pips’ smug expression.

“No,” he admitted. “Definitely not.”

Pips smirked. “So, no dangers.”

He let go of Zak’s shirt, and Zak automatically moved closer to him. “Just falling,” he said, his voice an octave higher than usual.

“Fine, Wingless. I’ll hold your hand.” And he took Zak’s hand in his own.

Zak suspected that Pips had intended to make him feel like a child, but he still hadn’t expected the fairy to go through with the action. “That’s just fine for now, but what about when I have to climb down? And where are your goons, anyway?”

“Goons?” Pips asked. “Oh, the guys?”

“Yeah, the _guys_.” Zak rolled his eyes.

Pips shrugged. “Dunno. Finding something else to entertain them.”

Zak dared to lean slightly over, looking down, but quickly pulled himself right up. “Watching me fall to my death isn’t fun enough?”

“I told you, I’m not going to let you fall,” Pips said, exasperated. “Why…oh!” Pips’ eyes widened. “This isn’t the game, Zak. You never complained anymore, so we got bored.”

“Aha!” Zak cried. “I knew it!” Then Pips’ words caught up to him as he fist-pumped in triumph. “But…why are we up here then?”

Pips shrugged again and looked away, and if Zak didn’t know better, he’d say Pips looked uncomfortable. “I just figured you’d seen enough of the forest floor. I thought you’d like a different view of home.”

“Oh.” Zak looked out to the horizon, again to Pips’ profile, and then down to their still clasped hands. “I do. Thank you.”

The corners of Pips’ lips twitched. “Don’t mention it.” He glanced at their hands. “Now do you believe I won’t let you fall?”

Zak's cheeks heated, and he pulled his hand away. “Yeah.”

Pips laughed, lifted from the branch, and flew behind Zak to lift him up again.

“Come on, Wingless. There’s somewhere else I want to show you.”

Zak ground his teeth and crossed his arms as his feet left the bark, but this time he didn’t fear for his life. Much.

“This is getting humiliating,” he said as Pips maneuvered through leaves and branches, careful not to break through the surface of the canopy.

“What, being ferried around like a caterpillar?” Pips teased.

“Yeah.”

“Good thing I don’t mind, then.”

Zak could practically see Pips’ smirk in his head, and he found that he didn’t mind, either.

They spend the rest of the flight in silence, only the sounds of Pips’ flapping wings and the life of the forest surrounding them. And then Zak heard rushing water. Sure enough, in another few moments, the biggest waterfall he’d ever seen—at human height or fairy—came into view.

Pips set Zak down on a branch overlooking the pool at the base of the waterfall, and Zak immediately got down on his belly, wrapped his arms and legs tightly around the branch, and leaned as far to the side as he could to look at the scene below.

The waterfall crashed down, creating a thick layer of white foam where it met the pool, but to Zak’s ears high above, it merely sounded like a soothing rain. _Or a shower_ , he thought belatedly, surprised at how foreign such a contraption had become to him in only two weeks.

The pool spread out, a small eddy leading from one side and veering off into the forest. Ripples gently lapped at the edges, where bright red and yellow flowers grew. Zak blinked at the almost perfect circle the pond and flowers made.

“We hold a celebration at the beginning of every spring here.” Pips’ voice filtered through Zak’s awe. He’d almost forgotten the fairy was even there.

“It’s…ah…it’s perfect.” Zak rested his head against the bark and watched small animals drink from the water and butterflies flit among the flowers.

“Not like your city, huh?” Zak jumped as Pips’ voice sounded right against his ear, and he slid to the side of the branch before he could stop himself.

Pips pulled him back up. “You have no balance at all, human.”

Zak straightened himself, legs around the branch, hands bracing himself, his back to Pips. “I did when I was human. I wish Crysta could just change me back—”

“Maybe you’re wishing for the wrong thing.”

Zak blinked. The wrong thing? What else could he wish for besides to get his height back and go back h—

He glanced back down at the picturesque scene below him and tried to overlay images of his apartment back in the city on it. The pool turned into a dirty puddle on the sidewalk. The animals turned into people in gray and black coats rushing around, their heads bent toward the ground while they avoided the cold, steely skyscraper in the waterfall. The butterflies swirled around in smoke and steam from the manholes in the street, over which cars honked and screeched.

Zak shook the images and sounds from his head and found himself staring into Pips’ eyes. The red-head sat in front of him, elbows on the bark, chin in his palms. Zak felt something brush against his shoulders: the tips of Pips’ wings, forming a sheer cocoon around their faces.

“Do you really want to go back home so badly?” Pips asked.

Home? Immediately, Zak pictured the fairy glade, and Crysta, and Batty, and even the goons. What did Pips mean…

Oh. _Oh._ Pips meant the city. Realization hit Zak like a berry on the head, and he smiled and shook his head. “You’re right. I was thinking about this all wrong.”

Pips smiled back and leaned closer. “Of course I’m right. So what are you going to do about it?”

Zak bent toward Pips. “Wish for something else. Those butterflies had once been caterpillars, after all.” His head felt fuzzy. Pips’ green eyes seemed to grow bigger, pulling him in like the water far below him.

Pips pulled away and disappeared into the sky, laughing.

“Hey!” Zak propelled himself to his feet, searching for Pips. “Where’d you go?” He looked up into the canopy, and his foot slipped, causing him to lose his balance and tumble over the side of the branch.

Something caught him in mid-air. “Told you I wouldn’t let you fall,” Pips said, and Zak laughed. “Where to, Wingless?”

If all went well, Pips was going to have to find a new nickname for him. Zak pointed. “Home.”


End file.
